For many years this was dismissed as being a forgery! Now archaeologists have determined hat a Maya book written almost 900 years ago is genuine. In looking at the few pics, there are some pretty strange-looking figures here. Pics posted below!
(I do find this very interesting, but certainly have no personal knowledge re: the Mayas!)
ars Technica
Annalee Newitz - 9/11/2016
In a rare reversal, archaeologists have determined that a Maya book written almost 900 years ago is genuine—after decades of believing it was fake. The Grolier Codex was so named because it was first displayed in 1971 at the book lovers' Grolier Club in New York City. Archaeologist Michael Coe, who arranged the 1971 showing, later described its rather questionable history in a book.
It was acquired in a spectacularly scammy way in 1966 by a Mexican collector named Josué Sáenz. Coe says that Sáenz told him that a group of unknown men offered to sell the book to him, along with a few other items found "in a dry cave" near the foothills of the Sierra de Chiapas. They would only sell it if Sáenz agreed never to tell anyone or show the book. The collector, intrigued, took a plane to a remote airstrip with two experts, who declared the codex fake. But Sáenz went with his gut and bought the codex. After allowing Coe to display it in New York, he gave it to the Mexican government.
There were a number of good reasons to believe the Grolier Codex was fake—beyond the sketchy way Sáenz procured it. Unlike three other Maya Codex finds, it had writing on only one side of each of its 10 pages. Plus, some of the pages appear to have been cut relatively recently. There are odd discrepancies in the book's calendar system, hinting that a forger might have been trying to imitate a calendar he saw in another Maya artifact. The drawings are also unusual for a Maya document, combining styles of the Mesoamerican Mixtec people with Toltec attire. The Toltec were often hailed by the Aztecs as ancestors, and their art shares many similarities with late Maya art. Though carbon dating placed the Codex's bark pages during the late Maya period, it was not unknown for looters to find blank pages in ancient Maya caches and cover them in fake hieroglyphs to make them more valuable.
But now, Coe and a team of other researchers, including Brown University social scientist Stephen Houston, have done an intensive reevaluation of the Grolier Codex and declared it genuine. They published their analysis in the latest issue of Maya Archaeology, along with a complete facsimile of the Codex itself. It turns out to be a 104-year-long calendar predicting the movements of Venus. The book's Toltec-influenced style wouldn't have been that unusual at the time it was created during the late Maya period, when the Maya city of Chichen Itza was built in Yucatán. That city's architecture also combines influences of the Toltec with more classical Maya symbolism.
Read more: http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/confirmed-mysterious-ancient-maya-book-grolier-codex-is-genuine/
(https://s22.postimg.org/r9erghrgh/Screen_Shot_2016_10_04_at_11_33_43_PM.jpg)
(https://s14.postimg.org/5c2sehlv5/Screen_Shot_2016_10_04_at_11_34_17_PM.jpg)
(https://s14.postimg.org/tyg7iklhd/Screen_Shot_2016_10_04_at_11_35_23_PM.jpg)
(https://s9.postimg.org/b01tdfoj3/Screen_Shot_2016_10_04_at_11_35_55_PM.jpg)
(https://s16.postimg.org/ojrijvuyd/Screen_Shot_2016_10_04_at_11_36_31_PM.jpg)
The artist of these images have clearly had a DMT or psilocybin mushroom experience, possibly both.
One of the things I have noticed in these pics - the times when we can get a look at what probably is a whole hand, they each appear with a thumb and just 2 or 3 fingers. Same thing for the feet - a big toe and 3 small ones!
There really is some strangeness in each of these pics! With 3 of the pics the central character is holding some sort of rope with someone else on the other end of it.
Now, if ArMaP could just come up with some "better" pics for us on this................just kidding!! :D
Quote from: rdunk on October 05, 2016, 06:44:06 PM
Now, if ArMaP could just come up with some "better" pics for us on this................just kidding!! :D
Not better, but slightly bigger, and of all the pages, here (http://www.mayavase.com/grol/grolier.html). :)
Quote from: rdunk on October 05, 2016, 06:44:06 PM
There really is some strangeness in each of these pics! With 3 of the pics the central character is holding some sort of rope with someone else on the other end of it.
He is also holding a weapon and the person on the end of the rope is kneeling. It looks like a sacrifice scene to me, perhaps sacrificing an enemy.
The pile of boxes with 4 segments could be the hearts of sacrificed people (the heart has four chambers).
Pure speculation though.
Maybe its the original Masons initiating someone but the used to tie them by the neck! :P
Quote from: Pimander on October 05, 2016, 09:23:40 PM
Maybe its the original Masons initiating someone but the used to tie them by the neck! :P
In the first of the 5 pics I posted, the person at the end of the rope is either squatting or kneeling down. With my first glance, I saw the squatting/kneeling figure as maybe a female. The front half of the head is bald, but maybe hair is noted across the back half of head - or is that feathers from the bird?. :)) Also, there is a fairly obvious possible necklace hanging down from this person. ??
Interesting.
The Mayan art resembles the Aztec quite a bit.
Here is an interesting fellow seated in something like a star with odd controls at his fingertips -
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/page_71_zpsnghwzzl6.jpg)
Here we have a temple in the center with what appears to be red carpet with fringes on the edge. Problem is - that is not carpet and those are not fringes -
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/page_51_zps5gzxzko3.jpg)
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/page_50_zpsbfsukmja.jpg)
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/page_76_zpsxdtohtuw.jpg)
lower left -
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/codex_zpshk3euwkw.png)
upper right -
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/wedding-of-3-Flint_zps4saqvvme.jpg)
Apparently they also shared an affinity for skull racks.
Mayan -
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/ancient-mayan-rituals-skulls-sacrificed-23019817_zps8qnijktv.jpg)
Aztec -
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/Aztec-human-sacrifice-skull_zpskuwhzdur.jpg)
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/p6171121_zpsnxaz6wwy.jpg)
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/skull-rack_zpsxkphnkfu.gif)
(http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l595/A51Watcher/Aztec/8143370322097035_zpsk9teagqn.jpg)
A51 watcher said. "Interesting. The Mayan art resembles the Aztec quite a bit.
Here is an interesting fellow seated in something like a star with odd controls at his fingertips" -
You are right A51! There are many similarities in the works of both! Really a lot of different stuff in the Aztec pics!! II suppose there are people who study these, and maybe have some understanding of the story of all of these such pics!